Which lighting should I use for seedlings?

What is the best lighting for seedlings?

Spring is coming, but winter is still here, so it's time to start your vegetable garden seedlings. Whether you are a beginner or an experienced gardener, whether you have a few plants or several dozen, we have listed our best tips for lighting your seedlings and encouraging their growth.

You dream of beautiful and strong seedlings, but this winter the weather is grey, the days are short and natural light is lacking? Why not opt for artificial lighting?

Artificial lighting is a way of compensating for the lack of sunlight in winter and sometimes even in early spring. By using a supplemental lamp, you can achieve maximum growth and vigour in terms of the speed at which your plants develop.

How it works

Prepare your seedlings in the usual way, then place your lighting system above the plants. Make sure the lights are very close to the seedlings, a few inches above them, and raise the lights as the plants grow, but always keep them above the foliage.

You can cover your seedlings with a mini greenhouse to speed up the germination process, but this is not essential.

From the moment the seeds germinate and the first leaves appear, make sure you give your seedlings good, strong light.

We recommend artificial light for about 16 hours a day to allow the seedlings to adapt to their natural environment once the indoor period is over.

If you can, put your seedling lights on a timer to ensure a constant amount of light.

Why use LED lighting?

Obviously, we advise you to choose LED lighting. In fact, LED lights consume much less energy than conventional lighting, such as fluorescent tubes, and given the duration of lighting required for seedling growth, LEDs are the best in terms of consumption/price. They are also of better quality, both in terms of light output and lifetime.

So which lights should I use ?

To promote seedling growth, you need light sources that are powerful and long-lasting. Depending on your installation, you can use all kinds of bulbs and LED lights. At Any-Lamp we offer LED strips for your small and medium seedlings and LED panels for your larger seedlings. You can also find the right accessories for a perfect installation.